Simi Valley’s Slowdown Brings Taunts, Victory

Simi Valley High basketball Coach Dean Bradshaw was the most unpopular person in the Hart gym last week.

Bradshaw instructed his team to hold the ball as the Pioneers entered one overtime after another against Culver City in the semifinals of the Hart Holiday Classic. The result was four three-minute overtime periods in which the teams produced six points-- combined --after ending regulation tied, 70-70.

Simi Valley center Vernon Simmons controlled the jump ball during the first three overtimes and point guard Ryan Briggs held the ball near the 10-second line while Culver City stayed in a two-three zone defense. In each instance, Briggs started to run the offense with 10 seconds remaining and Simi Valley missed shots at the buzzer.

After three scoreless extra periods, the Pioneers won, 74-72, on Simmons’ four points in overtime No. 4. Simi Valley lost to Hart, 62-61, Wednesday night in the championship game.

The slowdown tactic so enraged the 900 or so spectators that they booed and threw coins on the floor. Much of the crowd was eagerly awaiting the semifinal between Hart and Beverly Hills, which followed--and didn’t end until past 11 p.m.

“A lot of people think we were dictating the tempo, but they were,” Bradshaw said. “We were just trying to win the game. We were showing them they would have to come out and play us.

“I advocate playing with a shot clock as do many other coaches, but you play by the rules as they are.”

Culver City Coach Marty Siegal said he told his team not to challenge the Pioneers because of the problems the Centaurs were having on defense.

“They were just killing us on (back-door cuts) all night long,” Siegal said. “We practiced for that play, but we didn’t do a good job defending against it. But (holding the ball) just isn’t basketball.”

Said Briggs: “Yeah, people were getting pretty angry, but we didn’t care. You get used to boos when you play at Simi Valley.”

DECISIONS, DECISIONS

Kevin Krim, a senior linebacker-tight end for Thousand Oaks, said he has been accepted to Harvard. Whether he will attend is another story.

Krim, a 4.0 student who ranks first academically among 562 in his class, still is waiting to hear from Stanford and Princeton.

Hmmm . . . Harvard, Stanford and Princeton. Must be tough.

“Yeah,” Krim said. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

Krim, who aspires to be a lawyer, knows one thing: Wherever he decides to go, he will play football as a walk-on, if at all.

“I really don’t think I’d be able to play at Stanford,” he said. “I still have a lot of things to think about. I figure, if I have the choice, I’d like to think it over and make the right choice.”

IT SPELLS TROUBLE

Fame is fleeting.

Notre Dame standout Monte Marcaccini might be the best boys’ basketball player in the area. He has signed a letter of intent to play next season at Indiana.

Yet on the school roster board, posted on the gym wall, his name is spelled “Marciccini.”

NETWORKING

Kennedy kicker Jeremy Deach ran into former teammate Elijah Raphael during the recent holiday vacation. The conversation went something like this:

Deach: “Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.”

Raphael: “You’re welcome.”

In what might rank among the stranger recruiting tales of the year, it seems that Washington State planned to use a football scholarship on a kicker for 1993. The word spread around campus.

Raphael, a former All-City tailback now redshirting at Washington State, told his coaches that his alma mater had a good junior kicker a year ago. A guy named Deach.

Washington State contacted Kennedy Coach Bob Francola, who sent a highlight videotape of Deach to the school.

So far, things are looking good. Washington State contacted Deach, an All-City Section 4-A Division selection in the fall, and is expected to set up a home visit.

SWATTING IN THE WIND

St. Francis Coach John Jordan should have it made. After all, he has a roster that includes five players 6-foot-6 or taller. Theoretically, the Golden Knights should be blocking shots and making layup after layup.

Reality has been a different story.

St. Francis (6-7) has blocked only 28 shots in 12 games.

The leader is 6-11 Chris Ott, who has blocked eight. Jordan attributes the lack of shot blocking to poor anticipation and inexperience.

Additionally, the Golden Knights are shooting only 36% from the field.

Explanation?

“We’re just not shooting the ball real well,” Jordan said.

MR. CLUTCH

Chad Reese laughs in the face of pressure. Or snickers, anyway.

Twice this season the Hoover senior swingman has been at the free-throw line for a one and one in the game’s closing seconds with the Tornadoes down by one. He has been perfect.

The first opportunity came Dec. 11 against Burbank. Reese was at the line with one second left and Hoover trailing, 50-49. He made both.

“It was a lot of pressure, but I was really just trying to block that out and focus on the rim when I got up to the line,” he said.

The next time the situation presented itself--Hoover trailing, 65-64, last week against Righetti--it was old hat for Reese. There were 19 seconds remaining.

“I felt really confident,” he said. “I wasn’t even really thinking that they were the game-deciding shots.”

OH, BABY

Everyone likes exciting basketball games. Everyone except, perhaps, pregnant women.

St. Genevieve High basketball Coach Dan Donovan’s wife, Bridget, is expecting the couple’s first child in late March, but with the type of games the Valiants have been playing she is afraid it could be sooner.

“She said she’s going to have the baby during the game if we have too many more close ones like this,” Donovan said.

The Valiants have played four games decided by three or fewer points, including two last week. St. Genevieve beat Kennedy, 68-66, on a last-second three-point shot by Jeremy Iaccino in overtime last Tuesday.

Bridget has seen them all. “Probably, toward the end (of the season), I’m going to have to have her stay home,” Donovan said, “especially toward the playoffs.”

ALLEY-OOP

Watch a Monroe basketball game and you probably will see it. It’s called the alley - oop and nobody in the area is doing it better--and more often--than seniors LaMarco Rich and Tweedy Stiner.

From the top of the key against Birmingham last week in the championship game of the Birmingham tournament, Rich fed a leaping Stiner a perfect lob pass.

In one smooth, swift move, the 6-2 Stiner grabbed the ball a foot from the rim and slammed it through for the team’s 13th alley-oop dunk, giving Monroe a 45-32 lead en route to a 56-51 victory.

It silenced Birmingham and brought Monroe fans to their feet.

“That’s our trademark shot,” Stiner said.

GREATER LOSS

Verdugo Hills, loser of seven consecutive games since starting 2-1, has sustained another loss--6-4 junior center Chan Cornish.

Cornish, who averaged 14.8 points and 11.4 rebounds a game as a sophomore, was expected to return to the lineup in January after being declared academically ineligible in December. But he failed to meet the required 2.0 grade-point average last semester and will miss the season.

“We’ll certainly miss him,” Verdugo Hills Coach Scott Kemple said. “We’re mostly just a perimeter-shooting team now. We don’t have much inside.”

Only one Verdugo Hills player stands taller than 6-foot.

Staff writers Steve Elling, Jeff Fletcher, Vince Kowalick and Paige A. Leech contributed to this notebook.